Reversal
by taylortot
Summary: A collection of one-shots set in an AU where Colonel Riza Hawkeye is the Flame Alchemist and Roy Mustang is her First Lieutenant. Not necessarily in chronological order. Rating may depend per chapter.
1. Studying the Tattoo

"Stop fidgeting, Mr. Mustang. I can't concentrate when you wiggle around like that," Riza Hawkeye said gruffly as she straddled his hips and leaned forward to inspect the lines of the ink on his back.

"Your hands are cold," Roy Mustang replied, his voice laced with annoyance and just as rough. He was older than her by 3 years but he still let her boss him around like he was her puppy; not that she ever abused her exceptional talent of taking control over him, but it was at times like this when he tended to overreact.

"I'm sorry," she said with a touch sorrow, soft and desolate. Her fingers stopped skimming and he felt her shift.

Slowly, he turned his head and peaked up at her, catching the unmistakable grief on her face. She'd been rather subdued since she came back to announce to his father that she'd become a state alchemist and saw Master Mustang pass away before her very eyes. It got worse when he revealed the tattoo to her after the funeral, like some heavy weight pressed on her and made her shoulders curl in.

Despite the fact that he was three years older than her, Roy still felt that Miss Hawkeye was his closest friend after the three years of apprenticeship she had taken with his father. He cared about her on some level, and seeing the despair in her eyes was worse than he could have imagined.

Slickly, he twisted under her so that he was facing upwards, laying on his back. His hands cradled hers where they were pressed against his stomach and he could feel her trembling.

"Miss Hawkeye," he murmured, surprised at her lack of control. She was always so in check; he'd never once seen her cry, and it was disturbing to see her so deeply uprooted from the rock solid confidence she always had. "I didn't mean to offend you."

She finally met his eyes and he was shocked to see her usually stoic expression filled with disgust. "I'm not offended by you."

"Then?"

Her teeth clenched and she bowed her head, her bangs falling in her eyes. "Did it hurt?"

"What?"

She fisted her hands against his stomach and began to shake a little harder. "Did it hurt when he put that thing on your back?" Her voice was loud, echoing through the empty house like the ghost of a hefty breeze.

He was speechless for a moment; astonished that she seemed so hurt and angry over the inked lines he'd allowed on his back. Flame alchemy was a secret that the Mustang family had been researching for generations; it was Roy's duty to carry the burden of the finished research even if he himself had no talent for alchemy himself.

"I chose this," he murmured in a low voice. "Don't you dare go around feeling sorry for me, Riza Hawkeye. Don't you dare."

She turned her head away from him and glared at the carpet, still shuddering against him. "I can't even imagine how much it must have hurt. I want to use flame alchemy for good! My dream to change this nation for the better can't be accomplished without it! And yet when I see it there on your skin, permanently printed into your back, all the secrets I strive for. . .I. . .I get _so _angry."

"None of that here," Roy replied softly. "I'm counting on you to do what you promised you would. My family has been after this research for generations and now that it's finally complete, all it needs is someone to carefully protect the secret and use it with the best intentions. I wouldn't have allowed you to see me half-naked if you weren't the perfect candidate, Miss Hawkeye." He patted her hands reassuringly.

She looked at him again after several long moments, her expression neutral again, though there was something warm about it. "Your trust in me is remarkable, Mr. Mustang." She rose up onto her knees and put her hands on her hips. "Now turn back around; I think I was on to something near the bottom."

He grumbled good-naturedly and turned back around. His eyes drifted closed after a few moments of silence but all the blood rushed to his face and his eyes popped back open when Riza began to shift downward. His body stiffened in a reaction he did not want to have as she pressed her chest to his ass, her chin nearly touching the small of his back, fingers tracing the Latin phrasing she couldn't quite translate.

"What are you doing?" he choked, his face burning red.

"Stop moving," she barked.

He tried to lay still and quiet but all he could think about was how her breasts were flattened between their bodies, her breath blowing across his skin, her hands unknowingly making patterns and creating goosebumps. This was inappropriate; he knew it. He knew more than anything that the thoughts flying through his head at record speed were not even allowed to be spoken. But this was Riza _Hawkeye_; put aside that she had been a fourteen year old girl when they met, she was a woman. A beautiful woman at that. And he was all too aware of it.

He squirmed slightly, hoping that his fidgeting would go unnoticed, but she cursed loudly and pushed herself up away from him, one hand firmly on his ass. The blush on his face deepened."Damn it, Roy Mustang, you aren't making this easy."

"Neither are you," he grumbled to himself. Her obliviousness was comforting in an odd way.

A sigh pushed from her lungs and she dropped back down, continuing to inspect the tattoo in the same fashion as before.

She pressed her fingers and her body into him hard enough that he wouldn't feel the shaking.


	2. Tiny Miniskirts

Colonel Riza Hawkeye was trying hard not to let the irritation show, but she'd somehow got roped into having a mock fight against the Fullmetal Alchemist and it would be a bad waste of time. It didn't help that her subordinates flanked her on either side as she walked down the hall, talking too loudly, arguing over who was going to win the fight.

Her 2nd Lieutenant, Jean Havoc, was in favor of the younger alchemist. "Come on, the kid can do transmutations without a circle; and he's young."

Roy Mustang, her 1st Lieutenant and most trusted assistant, scoffed at Havoc and crossed his arms over his broad chest. His voice was smug and full of victory. "Are you calling the colonel old, Lieutenant?"

Riza stiffened to a halt, as did the men next to her.

"Not at all!" Havoc sputtered, seeing the look on Hawkeye's face. The normal placidity of her expression was darkened by furrowed eyebrows and the strong line of a scowl on her lips. Ominously, she removed her alchemy gloves from her pocket and slowly donned them.

"If you two are going to insist on talking, perhaps you should talk about something that won't cause me to accidently snap my fingers in your general direction."

Mustang threw and arm around her shoulder and made a wide sweeping motion with his other arm. "Listen to that! Can't you picture it now, Havoc? Colonel Hawkeye is going to turn that midget into quite the human torch."

"Get off me," Riza sighed, shrugging away from him. Lieutenant Mustang had clearly had one too many cups of coffee this morning; she would have to ration that better tomorrow. He knew how caffeine affected him.

She began to walk again, heading toward the exit so that she could be on time for this mock battle. In honesty, she liked the little Fullmetal kid. Edward Elric was an inspiration despite his age and his determination was something she admired; his overconfident choice to fight her today was a mistake on his part, even if the whole thing had been set up through Mustang blabbing his big fat mouth. She shook her head; that idiot needed to learn better self-control with his tongue.

"When Colonel Hawkeye is Furher, she will rule this nation with an iron fist!" Mustang crowed, pumping a fist in the air as he and Havoc followed behind her.

She rolled her eyes and only barely refrained from gritting her teeth. "Stop displaying my intentions nakedly for all of Central Command, Lieutenant." He was going to get her in trouble with talk like that; the last thing she needed was Furher Bradley hearing that she was out for his assassination.

"And if I were you," he continued loudly, Havoc hanging on his every word, "the day I became Furher there would be changes! That day, all female officers would be required to wear _tiny miniskirts_!" He punched the air again, looking completely serious.

Riza spared him a look of exasperation; in the back of her mind she was wondering if he wanted to see her in a miniskirt. A small part of her wanted to slap him for having indecent thoughts about his commanding officer, but another part was a little bit flattered. She squashed it all down in a heartbeat; it was stupid to even think that way.

Havoc dropped to his knees and clung to the first lieutenant. "You're a miracle, Mustang! I'd follow you for the rest of my life!"

She only shook her head and continued on, leaving them to catch up when they were ready to start acting serious. Still, as she continued on to the exit, a smile tugged at her lips. They may be idiotic, but they were her subordinates and they were faithful.

"Alright, Fullmetal," she murmured to herself, pulling her gloves down more securely. "Let's see what you got."


	3. First Meeting

**A/N: So this is Riza and Roy's first meeting in this AU thing I got going, which obviously precedes the first two one-shots, but I hope chronological order doesn't really matter to you since these are supposed to be short and fun to explore how their relationship could have been if this had happened. Enjoy the chapter!**

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Roy didn't know his father was expecting a pupil. Of course, he didn't know anything when it came to his father because he never saw that man. The only people who ever showed up at their doorstep were either shopkeepers with the special research books or one of the town doctors dropping off the old man's medicine. Not some cute, 14 year old girl with cropped hair and fire in her eyes.

"I'm Riza Hawkeye," she said when he opened the door. She stood with such confidence in her step that he was distracted from the nervous shaking in her hands as she gripped a suitcase. "I'm here to learn alchemy."

"Riza girl, I thought I taught you more manners than that," said an older woman from behind. She had two more luggages on either side of her. Roy watched as the younger girl sighed, her cheeks darkening in color as she fearlessly met his eyes.

"How do you do?" she muttered with a bit of acid. He wasn't sure what to think or why this child was acting so sourly toward him when he hadn't even spoken yet, but he forced a smile and tried to keep the shock off his face nonetheless.

"My father is back in his study," he said as he took the luggage from Riza Hawkeye and stepped back to let both her and the older woman in. "I'll go-."

"No need, boy, I'm here." The gruff voice came from behind him and Roy instinctively nodded and shut the door behind the two strangers after they'd entered. His relationship with his father was quiet; neither one of them were quite the same after his mother had passed away in illness. His father had shriveled in on himself while Roy pretended that it didn't affect him in the least and both went on quietly with their lives, intertwined but hardly speaking.

He supposed that it was expected then, that Roy had never heard of an apprentice coming to study alchemy under his father. It just would have been nice so he could have prepared her a room in advance.

Mustang looked up at the older woman and sneered in contempt after taking in Riza's skirt and shirt ensemble. "You didn't tell me she was a girl, Christmas."

The woman shrugged lazily and dropped the suitcases side by side. "I didn't see how that was a factor."

"I don't teach women."

"I'm not a woman!" the young girl insisted suddenly, her face twisted in despair. "You won't even know that I'm a girl, sensei, I promise! I'll work just as hard as any boy, you'll see."

Roy quietly slipped from the room so he could get back to putting away the clean dishes he'd washed earlier. Once he was finished with chores, he could go outside and play ball with his buddies down the block, and for a 17 year old boy, the last thing he wanted to do was worry about what was taking place between his father and a little girl in the parlor.

After a long moment's pause, he heard his father say. "Well, you certainly don't look like a girl." A sigh. "Since you are paying exactly what I asked, I'll make an exception this time. Hey boy!"

Roy left his chores and grimaced before walking back into the room, where the child was expressing her gratitude in the form of a smile. "Yes, sir?"

"Take the Hawkeye girl up to the guest room. Set the bed for her."

"Yes, sir."

Without so much as looking at the girl, he grabbed two of the suitcases and began up the stairs, hearing her follow behind as her luggage clunked; she wasn't quite tall enough to carry it without it bumping into the steps. He had no inclination nor wish to speak to her, and she continued in silence until they got to the room Roy knew his father intended for her.

"I get this whole room to myself?" she said while he dropped her things by the foot of the bed. Her luggage was abandoned as she gasped and launched herself at the dusty bookshelf. "And these?"

"They're mostly children's stories; I read them growing up," he offered hesitantly after a moment.

She smiled brightly and with such childish vigor that Roy himself almost smiled. "I probably won't have time to read any, with all the studying I'll be doing, huh? Did your dad teach you alchemy too?"

"He tried," he told her. He left the room for a moment to fetch some bed sheets from the linen closet and when he came back, he found her sitting on the floor, one of the thicker encyclopedias that had been at the bottom of the bookshelf propped open in her lap. All things forgotten, he took a moment to be awed at this mature girl; growing up he'd only ever seen girls her age whine and talk about dresses. And here this Riza was, sitting cross-legged with her skirt riding up, soaking in the knowledge of an encyclopedia like it was normal.

She seemed to feel his gaze and looked up, her face instantly reddening. "What?"

He shook his head. "You're. . .odd, is all."

"Well, that's not a very nice thing to say to someone you've just met," she retorted, still blushing.

"I didn't say it was a bad thing," he responded calmly as he began to make up her bed.

She was quiet for a moment and he was nearly done with the chore before she spoke again. "What's your name?"

He looked at her quizzically, wondering why she bothered. "Roy."

"Roy Mustang, then. You already know my name. I suppose you're odd too."

"Me?" he demanded, slightly outraged. What ever had given her that impression?

"You aren't very friendly, but that's alright. I'm not friendly much myself," she said, looking back down at the book in her lap. "Master Mustang failed to mention he had a son when Madame Christmas called him about studying, so I wasn't expecting you. I suppose we're stuck with each other, huh."

Roy laughed at her, at this slender girl who was acting as though she was his elder, who knew how to assert herself even if it meant she was biting off more than she could chew. He'd always distanced himself from the pupils his father had tried taking on in the past, but they'd been boys with a confidence far superior to Riza's simple statements. Perhaps she wasn't to be written off as a mere child with a god complex like the others before her.

"Why are you laughing at me?" she demanded.

"No reason," he replied with a chuckle. "You're going to stir things up quite a bit with the old man this summer. I hope you realize that."

"Well, I intend no disrespect, if that's what you mean."

She sounded more intelligent than the girls in his class at school. "You may be right about that, but you _have_ misread me, Miss Hawkeye. I'm quite charming when I want to be."

Her face flushed and she looked indignant as he smiled at her. "Is that so?"

He chuckled again. "I'll leave you to unpack, Miss."

"Roy," she called as he began to leave the room. He turned slightly so that she could see his profile; her face was still red as an apple. "If we're going to be friends, you'll need to call me Riza."

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**Reviews are appreciated! Thanks for reading!**


	4. Death of the Undying

**A/N: **Hey guys! Long time, no update, huh? Sorry about that! I got a request from a friend over on tumblr, also known here on fanfiction as Melon Fuhrer, and she asked me to write another chapter so here you go!

Takes place at the end of episode 19.

Disclaimer: I, a lowly tater tot, do not own FMA

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Roy didn't like the feel of it at all, not the way his footsteps echoed under his boots or how the light bounced too brightly off Alphonse Elric's metal body. Barry the Chopper was too busy blabbering away at something but that sound of the explosion Roy had heard while he'd still been in the tunnels unnerved him.

Was the Colonel alright? He had to believe that she was. Who else could have made that noise but her?

The room they were in was large, and too white, too open, and a large set of doors loomed on the far side. He knew just by looking at them that they'd be too heavy to pry open, even with the help of the Elric boy. This was a dead end; they'd have to turn around and see if there was some other way. . .

The sound of footsteps interrupted his train of thought, short, staccato sounds that pierced the air and drew Roy's immediate attention as Barry turned around, a crazed grin in his voice.

"There you are, Lust."

Roy swiveled around to face the shapely form of a woman, a slightly exasperated look on her face and a red ouroboros tattoo at the center of her chest. He held his gun out in front of him, focused on her, ready to pull the trigger if he had to. If Barry knew who she was, chances were that she wasn't to be considered a friend.

Lust frowned at Barry the Chopper. "Number 66, why were you helping the Flame Colonel?"

"I thought it would be fun!" he crowed as he pointed his heavy butcher knife at her. "Besides. I want to chop you up!"

She didn't look impressed. Roy's foot shifted under him as he widened his stance, eyes narrowed, gun at the ready.

"And what about you, little armor boy?" Lust said, turning her eyes to Alphonse. She sighed and pouted seductively, looking up at the group of three through her long eyelashes. "This is a problem, isn't it? Such trouble. I was hoping I wouldn't have to kill _two_ sacrifices."

"A sacrifice?" Alphonse asked. "Two?"

Roy only glared her down. Definitely an enemy. He wondered about the Colonel for a moment though he knew that he should keep his mind off his charge and more on the woman in front of him. It was hard, though, considering that Colonel Hawkeye wasn't there behind him where he could feel her presence and smell that faint scent of wood smoke that always seemed to cling to her uniform and her hair.

Lust grinned wickedly. "Yes. You and another."

Barry charged at her. "Enough! Time for me to chop you up!" He ran a few steps, his armored body clinking, before he leapt with his knife extending, laughing maniacally. Roy watched in abject horror as Lust's fingers grew to the length of swords before she sliced through the air in a movement so fast he almost missed it. Barry fell to pieces around her, the knife skidding away, silence falling over the room.

"I just hate overconfident men," Lust said in a drab voice before turning to smirk at Roy and Alphonse. "Now then, I suppose it's time for me to send the lieutenant to join his superior."

Roy drew in a sharp breath, trying very hard to think through the shock of her words. What about his Colonel? Where was she? What did this monster do to her? His mind raced as his hands began to tremble around the base of his gun and he remembered the explosion he'd heard in the tunnel.

Lust began to advance toward him with the smirk still in place, smug as ever, the clicks of her heeled shoes the only sound in the large room. He watched her with blank eyes as he began to understand, as the pieces fell into place and his hands grew even less steady. It wasn't possible, right? What this monster was implying wasn't possible. Colonel Riza Hawkeye was a fighter, a woman with more audacity than he thought humans should be capable of. For her to be.. . .

"You said two sacrifices," he said, his voice raw as he tried to deny, as he prayed to a god he didn't believe in that this wasn't happening, that none of this was real. "You don't mean. . .you don't mean. . ."

Lust's smirk widened into a crooked grin, cocked to one side of her face with a satisfied look on her face.

It was confirmation enough. He knew what that meant and something in him completely snapped in half. The pain came fast and hard, swallowing him as the anger burned in his eyes, burned in the tips of his fingers. His face hardened as his hands steadied and gripped tightly around the gun.

"You bitch!" he snarled, firing off. One round. Two rounds. The homunculus staggered backwards from the blows as he continued to empty the bullets into her body. It wasn't enough damn it! She was bleeding, but the bullets were ejected immediately from her body as she began to regenerate. His guns were helpless against her, the frustration and the absolute horror of the situation ripping through him as he discarded one gun for another in a holster at his shoulder. A wordless scream of outrage tore from his mouth as he squeezed the trigger.

Over and over. Bullet after bullet, she stayed on her feet. He could feel the anger subsiding as he screamed at her again, feel as the utter desperation began to claim his limbs and turn them to lead, as the realization that he would never see the colonel again with her corn silk hair and copper eyes, that he had failed in his mission to protect her.

He fired off every gun on his person, all reason lost in the heated blur of his anger, his facade dropped from his face. The last bullet pierced into Lust's forehead and he clicked the trigger a few more times, cursing when nothing else happened. His heart felt sick, clenching in his chest so violently he thought he could taste bile in the back of his throat. He felt his hands begin to tremble again and the anger was evaporated completely, disappeared into thin air. He was left with nothing but the unbearable knowledge that Hawkeye was gone; his eyes stared brokenly forward as the rigidity of his stances loosened.

Lust merely grinned. "You finished?"

He clutched at the empty gun, gasping as his empty gaze turned toward the floor, his mind slowing. How could this have happened? Havoc was perfectly capable of defending her but he should have been there, not Havoc. He never should have left her side; it was his job to protect her and he failed and now she was gone and he didn't know how that was possible, how that was something that actually happened. Because she was his tether, his reason, his goal. And for her to be gone? Snatched away in some distant place where he couldn't even watch the light leave her eyes?

His eyes traveled back to Lust as he gritted his teeth together. He would not cry, not in front of this monster, not in front of the being who had taken the Colonel's life. His clenched teeth, bit back the dry, broken sobs that caught in his throat and he dropped his arms to his sides. There was no _point_ without the Colonel; she was the only thing left in this world that he was living for and now. . .and now she was. . .

He fell to his knees, his chest heaving, the gun sliding out of his hand. Bracing himself against the floor he swallowed the sobs and bowed his head, his shoulders shaking. There was nothing left for him on this earth, nothing to fight for, not without Riza Hawkeye. He didn't want to live without her. He. . .he couldn't live without her. It was unacceptable. It was impossible.

Lust scoffed at him. "You are weak and foolish. You poor, sniveling creature."

He was too empty to be bothered by her words. She was right, after all. He _was_ weak.

Alphonse's armored body clanked as he came to take a stance in front of Roy, his hands clenched by his sides. "Lieutenant," he said, standing between the military officer and the homunculus. "Get up and run, Lieutenant." He clapped his hands together and pulled a weapon out of the ground, the blue sparks of alchemy blazing the white room with color. Lust's eyes widened.

"Oh, so you passed through the Gate," she drawled and then her hands sliced through his weapon and pierced the helmet of his head. "It's a shame I have to kill you. You really are the perfect sacrifice."

"Alphonse," Roy said, his voice cracking though subdued. He let the pain have its way; with any mercy he wouldn't be alive much longer to have to endure it. "Leave me here and run away."

"No!" Al said.

Roy gritted his teeth harder, his hands fisting against the tiles of the floor. "Run!"

"No!"

"Go!"

"_I said no_! I'm sick of watching people die right in front of me! I've had enough of it! I won't run away; I won't let anyone get killed anymore! I'm going to protect them!"

The words vaguely registered with Roy, another wave of despair pushing at him as he considered that the young boy would die if he didn't leave. That it would be Roy's fault if Alphonse was killed. Fullmetal would never forgive him for that, but then again, Roy didn't intend to be around long enough to have to face the alchemist. Roy wondered if he had the strength to at least make his escape and return the Elric boy to his brother, if he could live long enough to do that before putting a bullet in his head but he was leaden. Immobilized by the loss of her, of Riza. He wasn't going anywhere.

Lust racked her sharp fingers through Alphonse's armor, shattering pieces of his arm and cracking his helmet. The littered shards of metal fell around them and then there was another sound. A voice.

"I couldn't have said it better myself!"

Roy froze as the feeling his body began to return, as the pain began to transform into elation. He had just enough time to look up and peer between Al's legs to see the shape of her against the dark opening of the entryway and then a transmuted wall flew up and the snap of a finger lit the room in a hot volley of flames. Alphonse bent over him where he was crouched on the floor - this kid using his body to shield Roy, still protecting him - but though he was safe, that wasn't where he wanted to be.

He was sure that when he had looked up, that she was covered in blood. And even if she was alive, that was not okay by him.

A scream flew from Lust's mouth and another wave of heat was snapped into the room.

"So I finally got you on the ground," came Riza Hawkeye's voice, edged in steel. Her hand was clasped at a raw, ugly burn on her side as if she was holding herself together, her clothes absolutely soaked in her own blood, hair torn from its favorite clip. A transmutation circle was cut into the back of her hand, Havoc's spare lighter held tightly between two fingers. Her shirt lay open to expose the burn and her bra, her expression all fire and ferocity.

This was the second time today. The second time she only just made it before Lieutenant Mustang was murdered for simply being his aide.

The homunculus, looking worse for the wear, her regeneration throwing red sparks across her body, glared at Riza over her shoulder. "You carved a transmutation circle into your own hand," she gasped breathlessly and cruelly.

Riza said nothing, merely pointed another column of fire at the monster on the ground.

"How did you get here with that wound!" Lust screamed against the flames. "I know where I stabbed you!"

"I burned it shut," Riza said harshly, roughly, her voice full of ice in contrast to the deadly, fiery expression on her face. "I almost passed out, but I closed it." She unleashed another hot wave of flames, struggling to maintain enough control so that Mustang and Alphonse Elric wouldn't be charred by the blast. Her knees were shaking under her but she forced herself to remain upright, planted in place, as the homunculus screamed again, the sound full of undiluted agony.

"You said you weren't dead!" Riza shouted in fury. "So I guess that means I'll just have to kill you until you stay dead!" More fire. More screams. She felt lightheaded but no one was wiser. The last thing she was going to do now was pass out before she could kill that damned thing. Not after what it had done to Havoc; not after what it had tried to do to Mustang.

She kept the crumpled, unconscious Havoc in her thoughts, forced herself to see Mustang slumped on the ground to fuel the anger and the adrenaline in her system.

Another wall of fire. Another wordless screech of pain.

Through the din, Riza could hear the Lieutenant shouting for her, only adding to the fire in the most literal sense.

Over and over, Riza assaulted Lust with a torrent of flames, warding off the pain, standing her ground because she would make sure this monster disappeared off the face of the earth before she gave into anything. The homunculus lunged forward and attempted to pierce through Riza's head with a single finger, but the inhuman creature failed and, for the last time, was ravaged by the fire from the Colonel's hand.

There was a moment of stillness after the flames disappeared and then slowly, slowly, Lust began to disintegrate into ash.

"Well done, Miss Flame Colonel," she said in a smooth, dignified voice. "You've beaten me and proved yourself. There are worse ways to die than at the hands of a human like you."

Riza said nothing, whether her tongue was held by the pain or just the total disinterest in replying to the creature who had almost killed her and two of her subordinates was not discernable.

Lust smiled as she fell and floated away into thin air, becoming nothing. "Your eyes are unyielding. I look forward to the day they are filled with agony. _It's coming_. . ." Her voice turned into a hiss, an echo, and then the body and the ash was gone.

Riza cringed and her strength evaporated. She staggered and fell to the ground with a sharp gasp as Mustang pushed away from the transmuted wall and ran toward her.

"Colonel!" he shouted, his eyes wide and shaken, Alphonse trailing behind him. Something in her chest released and she could breathe when she saw just how safe and unharmed Mustang really was, that he had all four limbs and not a splatter of blood stained his clothing. He dropped to his knees beside her and she looked up into that face of his that she knew so well before she chanced a smile at Al.

"Thank you for protecting my lieutenant," she said, her voice weak and fragile now that the battle was over. "We'll need to get some doctors for Havoc. He's been hurt even worse than I have."

Mustang brushed her bangs back from her face with a tender hand and it was amazing how palpable his relief was. She would give him a stern talking to later, for having believed the homunculus and doing nothing to save his own ass, but for now she was too injured and too happy to see that he was alright.

"You aren't doing so hot yourself, Colonel," he said as Alphonse stood and ran to get help. "No pun intended." A lopsided grin pulled at his mouth; incredible that just minutes before he thought he'd never smile again.

She rolled her eyes.

"I'll go get help, Colonel!" Alphonse shouted as he left the room.

"Havoc first!" she called out.

Roy shook his head, his fingers touching her forehead again, a spasm of pain rippling across his face as she gritted her teeth against the agony in her body that was beginning to make her vision go dark.

"Colonel, I need you to worry about yourself for once," Mustang said somberly, bordering on desperation. "Please. Just for once."

She smiled tightly up at him, trying to hold onto consciousness. "I'll be fine, Mustang."

"You better be," he whispered. "Or I'll kick your ass."

"Insubordination," she breathed as her eyes slid shut. The last thing she remembered feeling before she would wake in a hospital bed was a pair of arms that lifted her and the sway of a step as she was carried away.


End file.
